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Military Offensive Gains Ground in Mosul; GOP at Risk of Losing House, Senate; Philippines President Questions Ties with U.S.; S. Korea: Kim Jong-Un Fears Assassination. Aired 1:30-2p ET

Aired October 21, 2016 - 13:30   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

[13:30:00] REP. ADAM KINZINGER, (R), ILLINOIS: That said, ISIS is trying to, as they're losing ground in Mosul and Syria and elsewhere, they're trying to send the point mainly to their potential recruits and to their people they're still on the offensive. I think that's what this stems from it.

I'm not overly worried about the fall of Kirkuk, basically, but I do think we have to be aware that they are going to lash out. And that could include, by the way, lashing out in Europe, lashing out in the United States, or other places in the Middle East. It's very likely.

WOLF BLITZER, CNN ANCHOR: I know there's great fear that the ISIS terrorists, they can launch attacks against the oil fields, blow up oil fields, blow up a dam, if you will, cause enormous grief for the people of Iraq.

Let's talk politics for a moment while I have you, Congressman. Mark Meadows, a congressman from North Carolina, he's a Republican, he says House Speaker Paul Ryan could have trouble staying in that position because of his comments, his lack of support for Donald Trump. Listen to what Meadows says.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

REP. MARK MEADOWS, (R), NORTH CAROLINA (voice-over): A lot of the people who believe so desperately that we need to put Donald Trump in the White House.

ALAN COLMES, HOST, THE ALAN COLMES RADIO SHOW: Uh-huh.

MEADOWS: They question the loyalty of the speaker. So I do think there will be real discussions after November 8th on who our leadership will be and what that will look like going forward.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: You've told me you can't vote for Donald Trump, even though you're not voting for Hillary either. Could what Ryan is doing right now cost him the speakership?

KINZINGER: I don't think so, but, look, you know, Congressman Meadows has a history of threatening speakerships and dropping motions to vacate as he did against the last speaker. You never know. Some of these folks -- Ryan is not 100 percent to

them. Therefore, anything short of 100 percent is not enough. I think, if you look at Paul Ryan, the fact he was the first person to really talk about tackling the nation's financial problems, talking about tax reform, he wants to reach out to people that don't traditionally vote Republican. He's an optimistic person, and he knows when Ronald Reagan talked about a shining city on a hill, that's what we need to be again, not this angry, divisive thing.

So, look I don't know what people are going to try to do. I will tell you that Paul Ryan, Speaker Ryan, has my full faith, and I'll do everything I can to defend him as speaker of the House.

BLITZER: What about the Trump narrative, his claims of a rigged election, if you will. How does that affect your campaign and the campaign of other House Republicans?

KINZINGER: Everybody in their own district is different. I don't like the claims of a rigged election. I mean, there has been voter fraud in the past. You know, something I think we ought to always be aware of is signs of any voter fraud. But the most basic underlying thing that we have, before even getting into debates and before even a campaign, is people have to have faith that their vote's going to count. If they don't have faith, the whole institution crumbles. Making early claims they vote results are rigged, not only does it say to me, but Donald Trump thinks he will lose, but is also just a -- it may not be politically popular to say it, but we have to defend the basic tenant of democracy, which is your vote counts. So I don't like what I hear, but, you know, that's not been the first time this year.

BLITZER: Certainly not from your perspective, it hasn't.

Adam Kinzinger, Congressman, thanks very much for joining us.

KINZINGER: You bet. Thanks, Wolf. Take care.

BLITZER: Coming up, hopes for winning the White House are apparently fading for the Republicans. A Republican group is out with a new strategy to help GOP candidates struggling to maintain control of the Senate. We have details, when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:32:58] BLITZER: Welcome back. There are new signs the Republican Party is at risk, not only of losing the presidential race, but also the U.S. Senate. Take a closer look. Polling in New Hampshire shows the state's Democratic Governor Maggie Hassan eight points ahead of Republican Senator Kelly Ayotte. In response, a GOP group is out with a new ad pushing voters to re-elect their GOP Senator as a check and balance of what could be a Clinton White House. Watch this.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

ANNOUNCER: America's future is far from certain, but no matter whom the next president is, New Hampshire needs a strong voice in the U.S. Senate. That Senator, Kelly Ayotte. She works across the aisle to get things done.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

BLITZER: Our chief political correspondent, Dana Bash, is with us. Senior political reporter, Manu Raju, has the latest on all of this.

Dana, you're doing a lot of reporting on this. How worried are Republicans about so-called down-ballot races? Do you expect ads like this to start appearing elsewhere?

DANA BASH, CNN CHIEF POLITICAL CORRESPONDENT: Yes, they are worried. And, yes that is the hope. When I was talking to a source who helped get that ad that you just played on the air, starting today, in New Hampshire, it was explicitly with the hope that other like-minded conservative groups, more establishment-oriented Republican groups, like the Chamber of Commerce, will turn their attention, and more importantly, their resources towards the Senate exclusively.

Now, that is effectively what has been going on with regard to money, but message is the difference here, and that's what made that ad that you just played different from what we've seen, in that it makes pretty clear that this Republican group believes Hillary Clinton is likely to be in the White House. And the message to voter is, you want to keep your Republican Senator, in this case, Kelly Ayotte in New Hampshire, and you want to keep a Republican majority as a check and balance on a Hillary Clinton White House.

The goal, again, by the Chamber of Commerce, in not just New Hampshire but to try send a single to other like-minded groups, and even candidates themselves, to start to say explicitly we're not going to win the White House, you've got it elect me.

[13:40:13] BLITZER: What other states, Manu, are we see very tight Senate races emerging?

MANU RAJU, CNN SENIOR POLITICAL REPORTER: Assuming Hillary Clinton wins, Democrats need to pick up four seats to take back a majority. And they have a lot of opportunities. We're expecting them to probably win in Illinois and Wisconsin, the two on the map right now. Dana talked about New Hampshire. But also Pennsylvania, another very tight race that could go either way, go the other way. And you're looking at three red states that are going to be critical that Republicans now hold that Democrats have a chance, a serious chance, of winning, in North Carolina, Indiana, Missouri. Those could easily flip. Republicans really only have one pick-up opportunity and that is in Nevada. Harry Reid's seat is a toss-up between the Republican and Democrat. Democrats have a very good shot, just because they have so many opportunities. And if Donald Trump continues to slide and loses in some of those states by significant margins, it's going to be very hard for Republicans to run significantly ahead of the top of the ticket. That's why Donald Trump's performance is so critical for Republicans in keeping majority in Congress.

BLITZER: Manu, Mark Kirk, an Illinois Republican Senator, he has a lot of problems potentially as well, right? RAJU: That's right. He probably is one viewed as likely to lose his seat, but he is still maintaining, has an outside chance. Republicans believe that perhaps he could survive, if the Democratic Candidate Tammy Duckworth underperforms. But when you look at the landscape overall, Illinois is viewed as almost very, very likely to flip, just because it is so difficult for a Republican to win in a blue state, like Illinois, in a presidential election year. And there's no outside money going in to help Mark Kirk right now. So that's going to be very hard for him to win back. It's one of the four that Democrats are assuming they will pick up in taking back the majority.

BLITZER: And if they get a 50/50 split in the U.S. Senate, if there's a Democratic president, Democratic vice president, the vice president is the president of the U.S. Senate, and he presumably will cast that tiebreaking vote in favor of Democrats. Democrats would be in the majority.

Dana, a number of reliably red states are turning into toss-up states. Early voting results are showing that two in particular, talking about Arizona and Utah, are looking relatively promising for Democrats. Pretty extraordinary, isn't it?

BASH: It is. And some of these red states, if we keep the map up, are toss-ups for different reasons. Utah is because Utah is largely Mormon. That is not Trump territory, not at all, and the Mormon Republicans that were already onboard with Donald Trump pretty much left in a mass exodus after the tape came out of him saying what he said on "Access Hollywood." That, combined with the fact that there's a third-party candidate there, Evan McMullin, who is a Mormon himself, who has been running hard there, that the Clinton campaign thinks he actually could win that state and rob those electoral votes from Donald Trump. And then if you look at Arizona, there's a different reason that it is perhaps competitive. The fact that Michelle Obama was sent there yesterday tells you everything you need to know. The main reason there is because of the demographic changes. It is a growing Hispanic population there. And a lot of young people, also, and older people, for that matter, but the Democrats think that it is more ripe demographically than others.

And one thing that's surprised me, Georgia. Georgia is a state that nobody even thinks about on the presidential level. It is reliably red. And Republicans I'm talking to are very concerned that state could actually flip for Democrats this year

BLITZER: Manu, you're well plugged in with members of the House and Senate. It's extraordinary, isn't it, that the Republican leaders in the House of Representatives, the speaker, Paul Ryan, the Senate, Mitch McConnell, majority leader, both have been pretty silent when it comes to the Trump campaign. Right?

RAJU: Yeah. I mean, they're just in such a bind right now over Donald Trump, particularly Paul Ryan, the way he's handled this for months. It shows exactly the predicament he's in. The challenge for Ryan right now is that he, of course, came out and said, told colleagues he would not defend Donald Trump in the aftermath of the release of that "Access Hollywood" tape, but has not spoken out publicly against Donald Trump, because he does not want to get backlash from the right. But Ryan is in a difficult spot, because if you get -- right after the elections, if you do keep the majority, it's going to be a narrow majority, they'll have a vote on the floor of the House in order for him to be re-elected as speaker, and he cannot afford to lose many votes, particularly conservative votes, because conservatives could be more powerful in the next House Republican conference if more moderates lose their seats. So Paul Ryan is in a difficult spot because if he speaks out or does not campaign with Donald Trump, conservatives are not happy and are threatening to vote against him. That's one reason why he has been silent about Donald Trump over the last couple of weeks, and I'm not sure if he'll say anything about him before Election Day -- Wolf?

[13:45:30] BLITZER: I've been calling it the sounds of silence, quoting somebody else.

Guys, thanks very. Manu, Dana, thanks.

Up next, the White House teasing the Philippines government over its mixed messages when it comes to its relationship with the United States.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

JOSH EARNEST, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: I dub that person the Filipino Mike Pence.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

BLITZER: There's a serious growing fracture now in relations between the United States and the Philippines due to more controversial comments from the Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte. He's now talking opening about ditching the United States and instead siding with China and Russia.

Our White House correspondent, Michelle Kosinski, is now joining us live from the White House.

The key word in his comments is "separation," Michelle. What is the White House saying today?

[13:50:10] MICHELLE KOSINSKI, CNN WHITE HOUSE CORRESPONDENT: It's clear the White House and U.S. Officials aren't sure how to take these comments for a number of reasons. First of all, Duterte, the new president of the Philippines, is a guy who built his presidency on making these sweeping and extremely controversial statements. This is the same person who on the eve of his first meeting with President Obama, or what was supposed to be the first meeting, cursed President Obama and said he would curse him again if he brought up the extrajudicial killings of people during the Philippines drug war. The White House then canceled that meeting that was supposed to take place.

So the White House knows that a lot of what Duterte has been saying is rhetoric that seems designed to get attention for the Philippines, to make his case of an independent Philippines with less U.S. influence, and to get a rise out of the U.S.

But he stated clearly on Thursday that he wants to separate from the U.S. militarily and economically. What complicates things is that, since then, his trade minister said, no, he didn't talk about separation. His spokesperson said he has no intention of ending any ties, even trade ties with the U.S.

So here's how the White House responded with a little something unexpected of its own. Listen.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: His office today is seeming like they want to walk so some of it back.

EARNEST: I dub that person the Filipino Mike Pence. We haven't heard my specifics from the Filipino government about what precisely President Duterte means when he refers to a separation. But those comments are creating unnecessary uncertainty in our relationship.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KOSINSKI: Yes, he really did call the spokesperson for Rodrigo Duterte the Filipino Mike Pence. He's joking when saying that, but this is obviously rocky. It's a 70-year relationship. There were recently signed new updates in the defense agreement. This is a treaty partner in the U.S. in the critical South China Sea. And this is a force to be reckoned with against China and its growing influence in that region. So the U.S. considers the Philippines to be an important partner in that region. But when Duterte repeatedly makes comments like this, it adds awkwardness if not damage at this point -- Wolf?

BLITZER: And Donald Trump only moments ago used Duterte's comments to slam President Obama.

Michelle Kosinski, at the White House, thanks very much.

Up next, paranoia or legitimate fear? North Korea' Kim Jong-Un taking extra precautions right now, afraid apparently for his life, as reports swirl about assassination squads and inside players. Palace intrigue in the hermit kingdom when we come back.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

[13:57:19] BLITZER: Kim Jong-Un right now apparently fearing for his life. There are rumblings out there of secret squads of assassin gathered in South Korea ready to strike.

But as our Paula Hancocks reports, the most serious threat against the North Korean's leader's life may come from within his country's own confined borders.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE) PAULA HANCOCKS, CNN CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): Is Kim Jong-Un an assassination target? South Korea wants you to think he is. The defense minister says an elite team is on standby to take him out if there is a nuclear threat. The intelligence agency backing him up this week telling lawmakers that they believe Kim Jong-Un himself is worried about his personal safety, changing venues and schedules at short notice and buying explosives and poison detectors from overseas, claims we cannot independently confirm.

But some question whether South Korea could even get close to the North Korean leader.

BRUCE CUMINGS, UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO: I don't think there is any other leader protected like Kim Jong-Un is. If you were to assassinate Kim Jong-Un, Seoul would be completely destroyed, and undoubtedly North Korea would lose that war, but you are just playing with fire.

HANCOCKS: Kang Myung-do says he believes that the threat to Kim Jong- Un is closer to home.

The son-in-law of a former prime minister of North Korea, Kang has contacts with some of the elites still in Pyongyang despite defecting two decades ago.

"Since Kim Jong-Un keeps killing many of the high class, they tell me they don't trust him. There is a possibility someone could assassinate him to save their own life, not an organized plan but a very real chance of an impulsive assassination."

Kang claims he recently met a member of the elite who still lives in North Korea who confirmed the threat of an inside job is creditable.

Since Kim Jong-Un executed his own uncle at the end of 2013, a number of defectors say elites feel for their own safety. Further high- profile executions just reaffirm that mistrust.

(on camera); There have been a number of elite defections since Kim Jong-Un took power at the end of 2011, including one just a couple of months ago, a senior diplomat stationed in the United Kingdom, which would suggest those closest to the North Korean leader still do feel serious fear about falling from favor.

South Korean intelligence officials estimate that, so far this year, Kim Jong-Un has ordered the public execution of 64 people.

Paula Hancocks, CNN, Seoul.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

BLITZER: Paula, thanks very much.

That's it for me. Thanks for watching.

The news continues next on CNN.

[14:00:13] BROOKE BALDWIN, CNN ANCHOR: Hi there. I'm Brooke Baldwin. You're watching CNN.